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Giving his mom Cameron’s new number, Orlando only chatted for a few more minutes before she had to go. Lawrence was off the phone with Juliet. Which meant Juliet was off the phone with her dad.
Leaving Orlando to sit and wait some more.
CHAPTER TEN
JULIET
“That didn’t sound like it went too badly,” Brooke said when Juliet got off the phone with her dad. Juliet sighed and flopped back onto the couch, her legs tired from the pacing she’d been doing while she was on the phone.
“It wasn’t. I mean, he was a little confused because I just brought the guy home for the holidays and it’s not like I could get into specifics about why we broke up but…” Juliet shrugged. Talking to her dad had made her feel oddly guilty for bringing London home in the first place. She shouldn’t have introduced him to her family.
Especially because the more she thought about Brooke’s observation that London had been her rebound, the more she thought Brooke was right. Damn her.
Because she’d never felt about London the way she thought she should. In a lot of ways, she was sadder about losing theideaof him than she was about losing him. He’d been a quintessential rebound. Which she wasn’t proud of, but in her defense, she hadn’t realized it at the time. Because who the hell needed a rebound after one night?
One amazing, intense, life-changing night that had been preceded by years of an on-and-off crush thanks to undeniable and unchanging attraction? Yeah, okay, so in hindsight it wasn’t that big a surprise that she might have been rebounding after roulette.
“Well, that’s one thing on today’s checklist marked off.” Brooke raised her eyebrows. “On to the next phone call?”
“Do I really have to call him?” Juliet whined. “He texted me. I could just text him back.” She sounded petulant and she knew it, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself.
“You’ll feel better if you do.”
Dammit. Once again, Brooke was right. She wanted to call and have him pick up. The way he hadn’t last time. Though, all signs were pointing to this time around being very different since he’d initiated contact this time. Sure, it had been a text, leaving most of the ball in her court, but he’d been clear that he wanted to hear from her.
Sighing heavily, Juliet picked up her phone again and hit the call button on Orlando’s text. Her stomach turned over nervously and she quickly jerked her thumbnail out of her mouth when she realized she’d started to chew on it. She was more nervous about calling Orlando than she had been about telling her dad she and London had broken up.
“Hello?” Orlando picked up, sounding out of breath, and her nerves tightened. “Juliet?”
“Hey. You asked me to call?” She didn’t quite know what else to say, so she went for the obvious. Even as she spoke, her bottom tingled with the memory of everything they’d done last night.
And he’d picked up this time. He wasn’t going to leave her hanging.
“Yeah, how are you feeling this morning?”
“Um, good. I mean, a little sore, but good.” A hot blush rose in her cheeks as she admitted the soreness. She didn’t know why, but it made her feel vulnerable all over again to say it out loud to him. Telling Brooke earlier hadn’t bothered her at all, but telling him…
Sometimes she didn’t understand how her brain worked.
“Good. When can I see you again?”
The abrupt turnaround from avoiding her for over a year and a half to suddenly showing up to Thanksgiving, showing up at Black Light, and trying to get together with her again as soon as possible was going to take a little getting used to. She already felt like she had whiplash.
“Um…” She looked helplessly at Brooke, who shrugged, because of course she did because she couldn’t hear what Orlando had just asked. “I’ve got work all week.”
“What are you doing today?”
Whiplash might not be a strong enough word for it. Juliet shook her head in disbelief even as she answered him.
“I’m supposed to go get the rest of my things from… from London’s apartment.” Not home anymore. She’d already said she would cede the place to him —it had been his place first anyway. Though he’d made room for her in it, she wasn’t going to take his home from him. Especially when Brooke was so willing and eager to let her move in.
London might be a judgmental prick, but Juliet wasn’t an asshole. Now that she’d realized she’d kinda used him as a rebound, she was even more glad she’d insisted he stay in his home. She would have felt twice as bad.
“What time? I’ll come with you.”
She looked at Brooke and mouthed the words ‘he wants to come.’ Brooke’s eyebrows shot up so high it was a wonder they didn’t merge with her hair, but she waved her hand in a rolling motion as if to say ‘yeah, bring him.’ Truthfully, having some extra muscle wouldn’t be the worst thing, some of her boxes were bound to be heavy.
He could make up for how he’d treated her last time by being useful and carrying the heaviest boxes.
